The expanded 12-team pool, which the board wants to start as early as the 2024 season, would include the six highest-ranked conference champions as automatic qualifiers along with the six highest-ranked postseason teams. While the 11-member board — including university presidents and chancellors representing each of the 10 FBS conferences, as well as Notre Dame president John Jenkins — approved the expansion as an idea, it is only the first step in ensuring that the sector will overcome the four teams. It is now up to the 10 FBS Commissioners and Notre Dame athletic director Jack Swarbrick, who make up the CAP Management Committee, to oversee implementation. The committee is scheduled to meet Thursday in Irving, Texas. Among the main items on the docket will be when the 12-team field will go into effect. It could be instituted as soon as 2024 or by the 2026 season once the CFP’s 12-year contract with ESPN expires. A CFP subcommittee of FBS commissioners that developed this 12-team bracket was well received when it was first introduced in June 2021. After that introduction and before the expansion was approved, the realignment shocked college sports as Texas and Oklahoma announced plans to leave the Big 12 for the SEC. Since SEC commissioner Greg Sankey and then-Big 12 commissioner Bob Bowlsby were on that CFP subcommittee, the ranks were shaken with other conference commissioners halting expansion discussions while they reassessed their leagues’ positions in the sport. First came an alliance between the ACC, Big Ten and Pac-12 with the conferences agreeing to vote as a bloc on key issues. That alliance blocked the January 10 expansion 8-3 in support of moving to a larger field. a unanimous vote was required to pass the expansion. In February 2022, with the board largely expecting a rubber stamp on the previous vote, expansion was seen as a shelved issue for the foreseeable future. The Big Ten pulling USC and UCLA out of the Pac-12 this past offseason, a continuation of that round of realignment, brought a definite end to that short-lived alliance. Perhaps it opened the door to reinvigorated talks given that the ACC, Big 12 and Pac-12 won’t be bringing in media rights revenue at the level of the Big Ten and SEC in the near future. CFP executive director Bill Hancock previously said the playoffs would not be extended past the end of his current contract, which is set to expire in 2025. When launching national league game websites through the 2025 season just before weeks ago — Atlanta will host after the 2024 season, South Florida next year — the CFP seemingly confirmed that a format change would not happen sooner. If CFP aims to expand before its contract with ESPN ends, it faces a hurdle in having to find enough game venues (probably on campus for early-round games) and put in place the proper logistics (hotel rooms, practice facilities, etc.) etc.) in a short period of time. While those remain major hurdles, several sources told Dodd that all could be cleared up with 28 months before a potentially expanded playoff in 2024. “My answer in general is, if people want it [to do it]anything can happen,” said Mountain West commissioner Craig Thompson, one of four key members of that subcommittee along with Sankey, Bowlsby and Swarbrick. A 12-team playoff has been valued at $1.2 billion annually, industry sources told Dodd, up from the current $600 million the CFP earns from ESPN. Unless an extension is enacted before the 2026 season, the CFP would be leaving significant money on the table. ESPN will own rights to any additional CFP games through the final two years of its 12-year deal. There is still widespread support for the CFP media rights to go to multiple bidders once the ESPN contract expires. The Big Ten recently signed a $1.2 billion annual deal with CBS, Fox and NBC to broadcast their games.
